Amid riots in the United Kingdom, India on Tuesday issued an advisory, urging its citizens visiting the country to be cautious and follow the the advice of security agencies.
The Indian High Commission in London is closely monitoring the situation. "Visitors from India are advised to stay vigilant and exercise due caution while travelling in the UK," the High Commission said in a post on X.
This comes as the fatal stabbing of three young girls in the northwest English town of Southport last week resulted in anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim groups unleashing a wave of violence in English towns and cities.
Foreign states' role
The UK government said it was examining whether or not foreign states played any role in the disinformation campaign which saw anti-muslim and anti-immigration protesters unleash riots.
The trigger for the riots happened last week after three girls were murdered at a Taylor Swift-themed event in Southport, a seaside town in
northern England. However, fake messages went viral stating that the suspected killer was an Islamist migrant.
Indian travellers would be aware of recent disturbances in some parts of the United Kingdom. The High Commission of India in London is closely monitoring the situation. Visitors from India are advised to stay vigilant and exercise due caution while travelling in the UK. It is… pic.twitter.com/0t1f35qU3G
— ANI (@ANI) August 6, 2024
The authorities said it was looking to see how much impact foreign states had had in promoting the false messages. "We have seen bot activity online, much of which may well be amplified or have the involvement of state actors, amplifying some of the disinformation and misinformation that we've seen," a spokesperson for Prime Minister Keir Starmer told reporters. "And that is something that the NCA [National Crime Agency] and DSIT [Department for Science, Innovation and Technology] are looking at, about what we’ve seen online."
It’s not the first time Britain has probed state interference in its domestic affairs. The UK believes Russian state media outlets RT and Sputnik pushed false narratives about the 2018 poisoning of former Russian intelligence officer Sergei Skripal on British soil.
John Woodcock, the government’s adviser on political violence, has also hinted that "troll factories" in countries including Russia and Iran can play a part in stoking disorder. "I made a key recommendation in my review to give the intelligence services more power, more capability, to crack down on the way that hostile states are seizing on every incident to create misinformation and to fan the flames of British extreme actors," he said.
